Analogy: “the model ought not to be the ecstatically still saint, but the moved dancer … & thus I am drawn to the poem as a woven scarf with many openings through which light enters”

Theme: to speak against “falling silent” (Celan): “… there can be no doubt. The question is how the poem is to be returned to enacted speech.” & “there will have to be responsibility to a community which, in part, the poet has helped come into existence”

Goal: “the goal still remains transformation”

— all quotations taken from John Taggart, Peace on Earth (Berkeley: Turtle Island Foudation, 1981) and “Dance,” Songs of Degrees: Essays on Contemporary Poetry and Poetics (Tuscaloosa: University of Alabama Press, 1994).

Seeds Sown for John Taggart

To un-name the beasts throw outthe name of money

the man of power

to stain within

the definition, the definition

of silence

the man of power

that rests

you were waiting alone

in the room for the train

the definition

the proposition through silence

the man of power

that rests

the man of power

/ Lincoln Greenhaw

You were the you waiting alone in the room

for the train. Look how plurality has made you

inside of you. Your space is new;

never seen this you before. You

joined a diversified assembly of skin,

called it room.

/ Mickey Kenney

The voice alone is company but not enough

and you must stop it being quite so poorly-conceived

to un-name the beasts throw out the name of money

without the anchor of company, of money the voice

alone the voice is not quite enough but money

to un- the name the throwing of the anchor, the beasts

you must, to quite to stop their poor-conceiving accompany

their voice, company if it’s alone if it’s a beast if alone

but not quite alone, if it’s money but not company an anchor

thrown quite like a beast to pasture and if you money

the quiet voice it’s company enough, if you un- the beast you

stop it, the beast, being un- and conceived poorly the voice

alone the voice is quite enough it must you quiet you

must the voice you anchor, un-company un-moneyed

/ Kaelyn Riley

you are waiting alone in the room for the trainand the waltzing silence of one star’s light

to rise and speak with a green remonstrance

to speak of earth in the silence of stars

is to wait alone in a darkened room to wait

for the waltz to rise and speak out of light

(to speak in green tones)

when the voice alone is company but not enough

you wait in silence to waltz as a rise to speak

with a green remonstrance

alone the train, a waltz

/ Joanna Doxey

the voice alone is company but not enough

you were waiting alone in the room for the train

waiting alone for you the voice in the room

waiting for you alone in the room in the train

the voice alone in the train waiting alone

is not company enough for you alone in the room

it began where the other had left off

waiting for you alone in the train where the other

in the room had left off but not enough

you were waiting for the voice it began

the voice waiting alone for you it began

in the room where the other had left

you alone in the train but not room enough

/ Anamika Dugger

The voice alone is company but not enough

to dispel the silence of ringing and breath and beat

or tide and full eclipse the silence of disappearing

platforms and snow just starting to stain the concrete

dark gray to stain within the definition of silence.

The moon follows in bright silence bound to revolve

and reflect like my eyes in panes or your eyes

when we rise and speak or strain within the definition

of silence. The voice alone company but not

enough to stir of silence oceans or sooth the ringing

one voice doesn’t mask. I saw my breath when Earth hid

its moon you were waiting alone in the room for the train.

/ Rachel Linnea Brown

the name alone a record of money

money the stain of beasts

it began where the other had left off

bitter search ironic chatter the voice

alone is no company not enough

you were waiting alone in the room for the train

the train being not enough unnamed the beasts

of money set down the bank

there is an eye demand a green remonstrance

to stain within definition of silence

a room where the other left off

voice alone is company enough but to join

a diversified assembly to join a room

perceptible pattern of names rise

and speak a green green definition of silence

/ Matthew Cooperman

to stain within the definition of silencepanes ocean panes panes ocean panes

to strain

to see through the rain ocean rain raining

glazing down the sides

to the green moss

too sodden

to rise and speak with a green remonstrance

sift the grassweeds for seeds and space without sound

the round of rain ocean waves rain ocean waves

no waving or wavering in the bitter search and ironic chatter

it began where the other had left off

left a stain

/ Hannah Holler Blair

you were waiting alone in the room for the trainto join a diversified assembly

This feature “thinks through” the work of John Taggart, whose sincerity-in-sound-structure manifests as four largely continuous attentions: a significant body of work written on/from/about art, music, and literature; some of the most distinguished long poems of the postwar period; a poetry deeply attuned to matters of the divine ecumenically construed; and a particularly distinctive musical style that proliferates and permutates through serial composition.